1. Technical Field
This invention relates to simulation and training systems and more particularly to an interactive system for authoring and editing such systems.
2. Discussion
Many complex systems place great demands on their operators. As a result, operators of many such systems require many hours of training to reach a desired level of proficiency. Examples of such systems having high training costs include sophisticated stationary process control systems, as well as ground and airborne vehicles.
Since it is not always practical to train operators of such systems on actual equipment, various kinds of simulators have been developed. For example, for pilot training, hardware mockups are commonly used. When coupled with a computer generated simulated exterior view, these mockups can give students valuable experience with the myriad of controls and situations they will encounter when operating the actual aircraft.
Unfortunately, hardware mockups are relatively expensive to construct and may quickly become obsolete when changes in hardware occur. To overcome this problem, a simulation and training system has been developed which avoids the use of hardware mockups by simulating the hardware on video screens. This system is disclosed in co-pending patent application Ser. No. 995,569, filed Dec. 12, 1992, a file wrapper continuation of Ser. No. 07/605,621, now abandoned, entitled "Glass Trainer", which is hereby incorporated by reference. In the Glass Trainer system views of an operating environment such as an aircraft cockpit are stored on a video storage means and presented on a screen. Manipulable controls and changeable displays are presented as computer generated graphics overlays on the video monitor. The user can manipulate these controls by means of a touch screen. This system eliminates the necessity of building a hardware mockup of the operating environment since all of the necessary views of the environment and controls appear on one or more video monitors. The use of overlay images to simulate the appearance of the controls and displays in a plurality of states means that separate images are not required for each possible set of states of the system. In addition, the appearance of the simulated environment can be easily changed by simply photographing a new image of the new revised operating environment and by changing the appearance of the overlay graphics.
While representing a significant advance over conventional hardware mockup systems, the Glass Trainer system presents some complexities in the task of authoring and editing the simulation and training displays and procedures. For example, the author must consider that one change in a sequence or graphic display in one particular training sequence may affect numerous other parts and aspects of a particular training program. In addition, the author of such training procedures needs to be able to test various portions of the simulation immediately after making the changes without going through the entire training course.
Thus, it would be desirable to provide an interactive tool for authoring and editing simulated training systems such as the Glass Trainer that simplifies the authoring and editing process. Further, it would be desirable to have such an authoring tool which reduces the time required to edit and test the training procedure. Also, it would be desirable to have such an authoring tool which provides immediate feedback to the author regarding changed procedures as they are being developed.